Sammy rues costly mistakes

published by ikhan on Tue, 02/28/2012 - 03:46

PORT OF SPAIN - Darren Sammy, captain of the Windward Islands cricket team, is looking towards the final three Regional 4-Day Tournament games, against the Leeward Islands, Combined Campuses and Colleges (CCC) and Barbados, to earn valuable points in the 2012 competition.

The Windwards were beaten by four wickets to hosts Trinidad and Tobago in their Fourth Round battle at the Queen’s Park Oval, Port-of-Spain yesterday.

“When I look back at this game, how we (battled yesterday), it definitely gave us a good chance,” said Sammy, who is also the West Indies captain.

“In their first innings, we dropped five or six chances,” he added. “(Denesh) Ramdin batted really well.”

Ramdin hit a crucial 151 in the first innings to earn the Man of the Match award. Sammy continued, “being in a good position overnight on the second day, 119 for two, collapsing to (203) set us back.

“We just have to correct our mistakes. We have Leewards, CCC and Barbados left.”

Another key performer in the match was off-spinner Sunil Narine, who claimed 10 wickets for the hosts.

“I think, in our First-Class cricket, the more guys perform, the better it is for our cricket,” said Sammy. “People say the standard is not that high but once all the players perform, the standard will (improve). Once guys perform at First-Class level, they can take that into international cricket.”

Sammy did not bowl yesterday and he acknowledged, “I felt a little tightness in my hamstring. It’s nothing to worry about.

“Looking at the wicket, the way Narine bowled, spin would be the thing to get us wickets. And it did.”

He continued, “(Shane) Shillingford and (Liam) Sebastien did make a game out of it. I’m not really worried about my fitness. We have a camp coming up this weekend and basically everything would be okay.”